I hear how blunt that sounds and wish I could take it back. I see the way it clouds her eyes and hunches her shoulders, and I know I’ve hit a nerve. “Long story,” she replies, looking away.
We both take another sip, letting the night settle around us. I don’t push for more, though I want her to keep talking. I want to know what happened to make her come back here, I want to know everything.
We switch to chatting about safer topics, the things you say when there’s too much else left unsaid. She tells me about Moons’ Diner, the old-timers who come in every morning without fail. I tell her about the jobs I worked in Boston when I first moved there, before I knew that city life wasn’t for me. I leave out how I was hoping to build a new version of myself in that place, one who didn’t have to run from his past.
Her voice gets softer as the night stretches on, until she gives a big yawn and nearly drops her mug.
“I think it’s time we go to bed.” The words tumble out quicker than she meant them to.
My face must show my thoughts because her eyes widen, and she slaps a hand over her mouth. “I meantmybed!”
I chuckle, watching her scramble to explain.
“I meant I go to my bed, and you go to yours! You know what I meant!”
Her frustration is so amusing I can’t help but laugh again. “I got it, Nora.” But my voice sounds huskier than I mean it to. “By the way, I’ll be away for a couple of weeks.”
Her face falls. “Why?”
“I have a job in New Hampshire.”
“Okay.” Her tone is small, like she’s more upset than she wants to let on.
“I can call you.” I start to catch the edge of desperation in my own voice. “Only if you want it. You know.”
“Yes! You can call me. Or text,” she says, tucking a loose lock of hair behind her ear. “Or whatever.”
“I will.” I promise with more certainty than I feel while I pull my phone from my pocket and pass it to her. “Give me your number.”
“My number?”
“Yeah.” I shake the phone in the air. “Punch it in so I can call you.”
“Oh, right!” She takes the already unlocked phone with a plain, navy background and puts her phone number in. “I didn’t save it. I don’t know what you want to put in there.”
“Maybe your name?” I feel my lips twitching.
“Yeah, that.” She waves me off, turning away. But not fast enough for me not to notice her pinkened cheeks.
“Good night, Nora,” I say softly into her back.
“Good night, Jericho.”
As I walk away, I type in “Witch” into her profile and save her contact in my phone.
21
Nora
It’s been three days since Jericho left, and the nightmares have come back. Every night I hear the same sound of bone hitting the wall, but the faces are different every time. One time it’s my father surrounded by blood, another it’s the man whose face I’ll never forget with another man standing to the side wearing a mask.
Sometimes it’s Dick. My dreams run through multiple scenarios over the course of one night, and by now I’m ready to throw a white flag to Morpheus, hoping he’ll grant me something other than this. A calm, dreamless night would be awesome right about now.
Did Jericho really shoo my bad dreams away? To think of it, I haven’t had any while he was around. I need to talk to him and see if my theory is correct, and he’s the Cerberus of my dreamland.
But he hasn’t called or texted yet. I tell myself I’m not disappointed, but the way I keep checking my phone every few minutes tells a different story.
“He’ll call when he calls,” I mutter to myself, setting my phone face down on the counter with more force than necessary. The morning rush at the diner is in full swing, and I should be focused on refilling coffee mugs, not obsessing over a man I barely know.
